WILLIAM Hague has backed Philip Hammond’s controversial Brexit plan as a way of saving Britain from “disaster” as other top Tories round on the Chancellor.

The former Conservative leader has backed calls for a three-year transitional deal to stop our EU exit from becoming the “greatest economic, diplomatic and constitutional muddle in the modern history of the UK”.

He wrote in the Telegraph “There is the clear potential for Brexit to become the occasion of the greatest economic, diplomatic and constitutional muddle in the modern history of the UK, with unknowable consequences for the country, the Government and the Brexit project itself.”

The Tory grandee, who campaigned for Remain in the EU referendum, said of Mr Hammond’s plan: “This is seen by longstanding advocates of leaving as a ‘soft’ position or a climbdown.

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“But in reality it is a plan to rescue Brexit from an approaching disaster.”

The Cabinet row is threatening to derail plans for the next round of Brexit talks, which have already been threatened with delay over a lack of progress on a key issue.

Reports last week suggested the EU’s chief negotiator Michel Barnier believes the next phase of negotiations would be postponed by two months to December because of disagreements over how much the UK owes the bloc.

But Mr Hammond, who is currently in Brazil, answered “No” when asked if they would be postponed – and repeated the words of Mr Barnier that the “clock is ticking”.

He added the UK hopes talks on a post-Brexit EU trade deal will begin this autumn, although this was a less than certain verdict compared to an earlier upbeat Government assessment from David Davis’s department.

After the claims they would stall this autumn, the Department for Exiting the EU said UK Government officials were “confident” sufficient progress will have been made by October to advance talks to the next stage.

Mr Hammond repeated the words of Michel Barnier that the ‘clock is ticking’

Speaking after a meeting with Brazilian finance minister Henrique Meirelles, he said of the UK’s Brexit progression: “No, it won’t be postponed or delayed.

“As Michel Barnier, the EU negotiator says … the clock is ticking, we are already in a timescale that has to end on March 29 2019, which is when Britain will leave the European Union.

“There’s a discussion going on about how we then move from full membership of the European Union to a future relationship with the European Union and that’s a debate, a discussion that will go on through this negotiations.”

Mr Hammond also reiterated that the UK’s legal obligations with the EU will end on March 29 2019, including the jurisdiction of the European Court of Justice.